Over the next two days, an army of volunteers will fan out across municipalities from West Vancouver to Langley conducting anonymous surveys to create a greater understanding of approximately how many people in the region are experiencing homeless.
The survey will also contain questions about the circumstances that led people to life on the streets, in shelters, or living in their vehicles.
“It gives us a sense of who is experiencing homelessness, how long they’ve been without a place to live, the coping strategies they have to adopt, the reasons for their homelessness, and a bit about their backgrounds and identities,” said Lorraine Copas, with the Greater Vancouver Community Advisory Board for the Reaching Home program.
The last count, in 2023, found 4800 people to be experiencing homelessness across the 16 municipalities where the count took place.
It also showed Indigenous people are at much greater risk of not having a permanent home.
“A third of the homeless population are Indigenous, which, when you think of that population being about two percent in Greater Vancouver, a third is 16 fold,” said David Wells, who sits on the Indigenous Homelessness Steering Committee.
Copas describes a segment of the population as “the invisible homeless” and says that includes people who may be temporarily staying in vehicles, or with friends.
She said it also includes women who may be staying in abusive relationships because they have nowhere else to go.
In the hopes of making the count as accurate as possible, this year for the first time, there is a phone number people can call to self-report if they are in one of those situations.
Copas hopes it will help capture a more accurate picture of the current homelessness crisis, including those who may not show up at shelters or live in encampments.
Outreach organizations, such as Union Gospel Mission, will take the demographic data and use it to make sure they are delivering the right services to people, wherever they happen to be in their homelessness journey.
“Each data point is a person and it helps us align our funding to make sure it’s going to programs where we’re getting the most help for people that they need, and that we can provide,” said UGM spokesperson Nick Wells.
He said UGM has 110 shelter beds on the downtown east side between its main shelter and women’s shelter, but it still has to turn people away on an almost daily basis.
“We’re pretty much full every night of the week, not just during cold snaps,” Wells said.
“In February, we turned away 62 people. And so far this month, we’ve turned away 40 people.”
He said those numbers have included more and more seniors recently, many of whom are experiencing homelessness for the first time.
Organizers hope data collected in the region-wide count will provide a better understanding of just how many people fall into that situation – and why.
